ABC's Misleading Edit of Juror B29

The media’s misleading edits of statements connected to the Zimmerman trial continues. Now it seems to have extended to one of the jurors in the case.

Yesterday Breitbart News noted the ABC interview with Juror B29. The big news was that Maddy–her last name was never used to protect her privacy–had told Robin Roberts “George Zimmerman got away with murder.” And indeed if you watch the Nightline edit of the interview she does seem to say that without hesitation or reservation.

However, William Saletan at Slate points out that the unedited interview seems to show something different. Maddy actually hesitates twice when answering Roberts’ question which contains the statement “George Zimmerman got away with murder.” As Saletan points out “she looks as though she’s trying to
reconcile the sentiment that’s been quoted to her–that Zimmerman ‘got
away with murder’–with her own perspective. So she repeats the quote and adds words of her own, to convey what she
thinks: that there’s a justice higher than the law, which Zimmerman will
have to face “

I agree with Saletan’s take on this. Maddy appears to be offering a response to a statement that was presented to her. You can see Maddy’s unedited response in the clip below (Scroll in about 2 minutes).

At the very least, her answer comes across very differently in the edited vs. unedited versions of the interview. Elsewhere in the interview, Maddy says Zimmerman is responsible for “killing” of Martin; however, she also says she does not regret her decision as a matter of law. In another part of the interview she says “I know I went the right way, because by the law and the way it was followed is the way I went.” In fact, as we reported yesterday, she believes that, as a matter of law, the case should even have gone to trial.

NBC is still being sued by George Zimmerman for the misleading edit of the 911 call which made him appear racist. ABC seems to be similarly misleading viewers about what juror Maddy said and meant in an effort to generate headlines.